


Fusion

by vands88



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: (I'm going to hell), (trust me), Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Cannibalism, M/M, Murder, Murder Husbands, Oral Sex, POV First Person, Rough Sex, also cute fluffy dating stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-31
Updated: 2017-08-31
Packaged: 2018-12-22 06:52:51
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,291
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11962020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vands88/pseuds/vands88
Summary: "We’re in an abandoned barn on New Year’s Day and I can find no word for you except intoxicating."Canon divergence wherein Abigail is actually dead at the end of S1 and instead of Hannibal implicating Will as he had planned, decides to help them both escape the law instead.





	Fusion

**Author's Note:**

> Let's pretend that this wasn't wasting away in my drafts folder, 90% completed, for almost 2 years. Thanks to a friend for the well-needed reminder. 
> 
> As well as the fandom-standard warnings for murder, cannibalism, general insanity, sex, and violence, please also be aware that a character in this story is emotionally abused and there are detailed discussions of it.

We’re in an abandoned barn on New Year’s Day and I can find no word for you except _intoxicating_.

The metallic tang of freshly spilled blood still hangs between us, so potent that I can almost taste it on my tongue. My senses have become sharper and my mind has become as still as the frozen riverside where we displayed the body not an hour ago. And you are the marvellous creature that bore this change, standing proud before me.

Your hands cradle my face, determined, and then you’re kissing me; deeply, passionately, _finally_ ; stealing air from my lungs as if it’s yours for the taking. Taking, taking, pushing me back against a rotting beam that makes the whole barn quiver. Our splattered plastic overalls are the only barrier left between us - a meaningless physical barrier - as you devour me with your mouth and I gasp for you to take more.

I’d say I don’t know how we got here but I do know. I _do_.

 

That day in Hobbs’ kitchen, I didn’t even know my own mind, but I knew for certain that one of us had killed Abigail.

But she was our _daughter_. And if I believed that one of us had killed her, then it would have driven me insane.

And so, I went insane.

You took my face in your hands and spoke words that could have been the truth. You were so certain that one of us had killed her that I knew it had to be you. If it wasn’t by your hand then you were involved at least.

I’d rather it have been me than be you. I was mentally unstable. You were not. If you did it, you did it knowingly, and that was worse somehow.

“The evidence could very clearly point to either of us,” you said. “If we are to continue, Will, then what we do from here must be planned, must be together.”

You were so close, I could have imagined the brush of your lips against my forehead.

“Do you understand?” you asked.

Truthfully, I didn’t understand very much right then - my mind a muddle of hallucinations - but I understood that if I said no, it would have had consequences. You could have framed me. You had the means. There was evidence here. Evidence that could very easily have been pointed at me. _Together_. Whatever that meant had to be better than the alternative.

“Together,” I said. “I understand. What do we need to do?”

 

I went back to the FBI, you went back to your office, and the case of “Abigail Hobbs: Missing, Presumed Dead” lay between us.

 

“You’ve done something to me.”

You open the door to your office with a vaguely resigned expression, as if you knew it was only a matter of time until I pieced it together.

“The voice in my head… it’s you,” I say as soon as you close the door behind me. Too close. You always stand too close. “I don’t know when it happened, but you’re in my head.”

“You’re an empath, Will, it’s natural to-”

“Don’t. Don’t play that card with me.”

“Very well.”

You walk to your chair. I take mine. Just like old times.

“Be honest with me,” I say. “Did you know I had encephalitis? Did you… make it worse somehow? I remember things, Hannibal. Things that don’t put you in a good light.”

Your lips thin in thought. “I will not deny the treatment I gave you. I did what I thought was best at the time.”

“You were going to implicate me.”

You are silent for a long time. I begin to doubt if you’re going to confess, but then, after what seems like an age, you nod.

I try to keep the anger out of my voice when I ask why but by the look on your face I failed.

“I realised it would mean saying goodbye,” you say, sincerely, “And I found that I was unable to.”

I have no idea how to handle your honesty. It can be as brutal as your knife sometimes.

I rub my hands over my face until you are blocked from my sight and my mind becomes a little clearer for it. “We need to make a deal.”

Your face shifts ever so slightly. You always look so fascinated when I do something unexpected. “And what deal is that?”

“No more mind games,” I demand, looking straight into your eyes. “If we’re in this together, I need to know that you’re not manipulating me.”

Your eyes narrow. “You would only have my word to go by.”

“Then you’d better not lie.”

Our stare is a battle of wills. I don’t know when I became so comfortable looking into the eyes of a killer.

As we look, I realise it’s become difficult to know where you end and I begin.

You’re still looking into my eyes when you make me the promise. When you say you will try to reverse the damage you have caused.

“I want you to trust me, Will,” you say, and I know I must still be insane when I know that I do. I _do_ trust you. At least, as much as I trust myself.

 

I am called to a crime scene. Within seconds, I know that it is a victim that belongs to you.

I drive to your house and it’s not until I am in the large kitchen with no witnesses but many knives that I realise how much faith I must have in your promise.

“If this is your idea of laying low, Hannibal, I think we need to talk.”

“It was unavoidable,” you tell me, stirring vegetables in a pan as casually as if we were talking about the weather.

I shake my head. “I’m sure it was,” I bite. “But next time a warning wouldn’t go amiss.”

“Next time?”

I was too late to realise my mistake. I rephrase, “Well, I don’t think I’m in a position to stop you.”

You hold my gaze and there’s something soft in it under the apparent hostility. “That is probably wise. Are you staying for dinner?”

My eyes flicker down to the meat sizzling in the pan and I know with stark clarity exactly what it is, or rather, _who_ it is. “Do you have a vegetarian option?”

You smile. It’s strangely beautiful, and all the more for the danger I know lies within.

 

You seem to know everything before I do. (You are in my subconscious, after all.) You know I have a certain contempt for teaching at Quantico and so when gifts begin to appear at my desk I know that they must be from you.

It starts innocently, with a new pen. Engraved. Boxed. It probably cost more than every pen I’ve bought in my entire lifetime. It feels too elegant in my calloused fisherman’s hands. I probably wouldn’t use it if it didn’t feel almost like I’m holding you.

That thought is too much, but so too is the engraving. An infinity symbol. Your way of reminding me that our fates are intertwined forever. A threat? Or a romantic gesture?

Both. It’s probably both.

 

Driving gloves, a bottle of scotch, a sculpture… But the gifts don’t stay innocent for long.

I open the box on my desk one day to see that you made me fishing lures.

I know bone when I see it, and human hair, but when I go fishing that weekend I take them with me, and all the fishes bite.

 

“Are you trying to bribe my silence?” I ask during our next ‘conversation’. Bribery is the only logical explanation I have for the sudden gift-giving. “You’re worried now I’m recovering my memories that I’ll break our promise and implicate _you_ in Abigail’s death instead.”

You lean back against your desk, studying me. You never stop studying me but I don’t mind it like I mind with everyone else. “It wouldn’t be unexpected.”

I approach you, step by step, until we’re only inches away, like it might be easier to understand you from this distance. It’s not. It just makes it harder to think.

I find the pen in my pocket and bring it out to show you, the infinity symbol catching the light between us. “Together means together.”

You nod, and your eyes crinkle with a smile, but you’re still holding back, I can feel it.

 

You do give me a warning next time, in lieu of a dinner invitation.

“Are you… enjoying this?” I ask, watching you over the lip of my wine glass in the kitchen as you season the liver of the latest victim.

“Would you be surprised if I said yes?”

I take a sip and then carefully put the glass down on the worktop. “No…” I muse, and then tilt my head slightly, allowing me to see the events from your perspective, and my theory solidifies. “You’ve never had anyone to share this with before,” I conclude. “Anyone that knew but stayed.”

“No, I have not,” you confirm. “Nor did I ever imagine that I could.” You look at me then, in a way that feels like I’m staring at my own reflection. “I let you see me, and still you see more than I thought possible.” You turn your attention back to the food. “I appreciate that you are here, Will,” you say, your back still turned to me. “But, I must also admit that I cannot understand your motives. I do not believe you are playing me, for it would be extremely foolish if you were, which means you are either here because you are indulging your own morbid fascination, or because you feel indebted to me for protecting us both. Which is it?”

“Both. Neither. I don’t know.” I sigh. Sometime in this conversation I have come to stand beside you. I look down at the meat with my own eyes. That used to be a person. “You keep asking me how I feel but I…” I raise my head and you are too close. My sentence leaves me. You’ve been watching me the whole time but it doesn’t unsettle me. Everything about you ought to unsettle me.

I kiss you and it’s not even a conscious thought.

A second later and I doubt it even happened; you are attending to our dinner and my lips feel like warm shingle, my head soft with wine.

“I got you out of a murder charge,” you are saying. “Of course you feel indebted. And we share an experience that few would understand. For better or for worse, I have become your port in this storm. And so you have made yourself overlook my peculiarities -”

“Murders,” I correct absently.

You smile that damn smile again. Always so pleased when I surprise you.

“Indeed. Am I to presume you’ll be eating vegetarian again?”

I look back to the preparations. You’ve gone to a lot of work. It’s a stew of some kind and the meat would be difficult to avoid. I don’t like the idea but I could probably work around it. Besides, before I knew your secret, I would have eaten the whole dish none the wiser.

“I don’t want you to go to any trouble,” I say carefully.

Your hand pauses in preparations. Your eyes lock onto mine. If looks could talk, you would be fucking me over the kitchen table.

 

The victim comes to me that night and I wake screaming as if I am missing my own liver. I am dripping in sweat, breathing hurriedly, and I stagger to the bathroom to throw up the remains of dinner. I cannot bring myself to look at the result. That was a person. Someone loved that person.

It’s 2:43 in the morning and I call you like a reflex. You answer. It doesn’t even sound like you were asleep. “Will? What’s the matter?”

“Do you miss her?”

An intake of breath. You don’t need to ask me who. “Every day, Will. I think about Abigail every day.”

“But you still -”

“I was protecting us, like we were protecting her.”

I shake my head, though you can’t see it. “No, that was different, that was -”

“She knew too many of our secrets.”

“And we knew too many of hers!” I shout back. I am crying now, still hunched against the cold basin of the toilet. “We could have…” I whisper. “Together.”

The word seems to echo in the silence, and then you say, “Do you think we would have made good parents, Will?” You let it sink in; you allow me to construct and destroy a dozen short fantasies before concluding what we both know. “She may not have become a good person under our influence.”

I choke back enough tears to argue back, however weakly, “but she’d still be _alive_.”

“This is not the time and place to be discussing this-”

I make a noise like a strangled sob. I didn’t know I even wanted to talk about her until we couldn’t.

“But we will,” you reassure me. “Can you wait until our next session?”

I let out a shaky breath. If you think I can do it, I can do it. “Yes.”

“Why were you thinking of Abigail tonight, Will?”

“I think about her every day too,” I admit. “But tonight I had a dream… I was missing my liver.”

“Ah,” you say. You can put it together from that. “Like the latest victim.”

We’re still playing innocent to the FBI. It’s getting harder each day. They’re still investigating Abigail Hobbs’ disappearance, they’re still investigating all of the murders, and each day, the stag in my dreams gets a little closer to me, as if he’s afraid too, or nudging me forward. I can’t tell.

“I think…” I start, then think about how to phrase it. Nothing in our call so far has been incriminating as such. “Deaths are easier to accept when you know that they were not robbed of life.”

 

The next body that shows up is a man with no family; a man who had attempted suicide three times unsuccessfully.

“It’s interesting…” Beverly is saying. “It’s definitely the Ripper’s work but why choose this guy? Given the victim’s history, it’s practically an act of kindness. It doesn’t make sense.”

I pretend to be equally as baffled by the Ripper’s actions but secretly my heart is warming.

 

You cook me dinner the following night and when you serve it to me you whisper against my ear, “For you,” and this time I know I don’t imagine the lips against my hairline.

I am both thrilled and disgusted. I resist the urge to hold you in place.

When I have recovered, you are sitting opposite me, unfolding a napkin with a soft smile.

“You’re a psychopath,” I state. “Intelligent psychopaths do not change their motive.”

“They do not. But you made a request. A polite one at that.”

“Yes,” I say, trying to ignore the flutter at that sentiment, “but it’s not your pathology. You can’t have… enjoyed -” I say with a grimace “- it as much as you did the others.”

“On the contrary,” you say, taking a long drink of wine. “I enjoy it all the more knowing my work is appreciated by you.”

“I’m not sure ‘appreciate’ is really the right word…”

“No?”

I take a forkful of the dish while I think. It’s only after I’ve swallowed that I realise there was meat in that mouthful.

You look across at me smugly, having seen what I have done. You settle and then surmise, “It makes you feel less guilty knowing that you’ve minimised the loss.”

“Yes.”

“Then I am happy to do it. I still have a great debt to pay to you.”

“You don’t,” I say, before I can stop it from slipping out. Of course you still owe me a great debt. You made me insane, you killed our daughter, you’ve bound me into this vow of silence… and, yet, I act as if I have forgiven you. You kept me out of jail, yes. But that shouldn’t make us even. I put down my fork. “Do you think I’m insane?”

“That word can entail any number of things, the better question is, why do _you_ think that you are?”

“Because I think that no one sane would let themselves be caught in this position. No one sane would be having this conversation, sat opposite the Ripper, eating human flesh, and wanting to stay. It’s mad. Which means, I’m mad.”

You hum. “I think, Will Graham, that any psychological definition I could come up with for your unique mind would be an insult to it.” You raise your glass to me. “You are far more complex than madness or sanity. Together we have eclipsed any such terms. The truth is that you are a marvel, and I thank you that I am here to witness it.”

You are always so direct that it blindsides me.

I huff, I shake my head, and I try to pretend that I didn’t blush because a psychopath called my brain _pretty_.

 

Our next planned ‘conversation’ arrives and you have already poured me a drink.

“Do you still wish to talk about Abigail?”

I down half the drink before replying, “I want to know what you did.”

“I imagine you can already reconstruct -”

“I don’t what to visualise. I want to _know_. I want to know how you felt when you killed her.” My voice is shaky but I don’t drop your gaze.

Your eyes search me but I remain strong.

“You cannot imagine that too?” you challenge.

“I want to hear it.”

You turn away, take a sip of your scotch, and then walk over to the window. I follow. This is where we stood when we decided to lie about Abigail murdering Nicholas Boyle, at the start of our entanglement with her. It seems appropriate that we stand here now.

“You believe that knowing the details will help you overcome this,” you say, a little too steadily.

I do not know when we became close enough for me to know your tells but I know them now; you’re nervous, and I think I know why. “You think I will think less of you if you tell me.”

You look at me again but this time your pleasure of surprise is partially hidden by doubt. I do not know how long passes until you finally respond. “You want me to tell you how I killed our child -”

I have to look away from you at that. I have my limits. _Our child_ is apparently that limit.

There is a soft brush of fingers against mine. I turn back to you.

“I did think of her as such,” you murmur. “Do not doubt that.”

I swallow the tears that threaten to fall. “Was she scared?”

“Undoubtedly.”

I turn away again. I imagine myself in that kitchen. You inches away from me, as we have been so many times, as we are right now, and then -

The grip of your hand is firmer this time as you pull me back towards you. Port in a storm. You weren’t wrong.

“But she knows fear no longer.”

You are still holding my hand. You’re telling me about murdering a child I considered my own and holding my hand. It’s wrong. But I still fall to you in my grief and you wrap your arms around me as we stand by that window and mourn.

 

I dream about the stag that night; its head bowed over the body of a young deer. I approach, cautiously, for I have no weapon. The stag turns to look at me and I know that it would let me kill it. I stand next to the stag and thread my fingers through its thick fur in some semblance of comfort.

I feel your guilt like it is my own.

 

You decide to take me to the opera.

I feel ridiculous, and out of place, like a brief moment of lucidity in an absurd dream. I’m dressed in my best suit - which apparently still isn’t to your standards - and attempting to hide behind you while you talk to your acquaintances.

It doesn’t work.

You hook your hand around my elbow and introduce me to tedious person after tedious person as, “my _friend,_ Will Graham.” The way you say ‘friend’ isn’t like most people and the way your thumb strokes the inside of my elbow isn’t within normal parameters of friendship either. Then again, you are not most people.

We take our seats, the music starts, and I find myself watching you more than watching the opera. You catch me at it sometimes, and a small smile visits your lips before your attention is drawn back to the music. I’m so used to being your sole focus that it makes me a little jealous that the woman singing about lambs is deemed more worthy of your attention. I think about reaching over and lacing my fingers through yours. Your hand is resting on your leg closest to mine like an open invitation. I am still staring at your long fingers, daring myself to touch them, when I notice that yours have moved to give applause.

I snap back to the present but I know by the smirk across your lips that you noticed my distraction.

 

You call me next Saturday night. “What are you doing tomorrow?” you ask.

“Er…” I have to think, I’m on the mend but the night terrors still make the days a little hard to define. Tomorrow is a Sunday. “Nothing planned.”

I am crossed-legged on the floor, warming myself with a sweater and the fire, tinkering with a broken appliance. The dogs are lazed around me, Buster rubbing his wet nose against the hand holding the screwdriver.

“I suppose I might go for a hike,” I say, turning my hand to pet Buster. “Take the dogs for an outing.”

“That sounds pleasant. I’ll bring breakfast.”

“Okay…?” I say, not entirely sure what just transpired. When you hang up a minute later, I realise _exactly_ what just transpired.

 

You turn up on my doorstep the next day wearing a thick coat and that ridiculous hat of yours, with filled Tupperware boxes in your hands. I manage to let you in without the dogs sneaking outside and you drink my instant coffee without complaining. I am relieved to find that your idea of breakfast today is sweet pastries. You haven’t killed anyone since the suicidal man. You kill in sounders of three, so perhaps it’s time for a rest. Maybe not. Maybe you’re here killing time with me so you don’t go out and kill something else.

It’s as we’re walking through the dew-dropped meadows, watching the dogs run free, and sharing mundanities, that I realise that this probably constitutes a date. We’re walking so closely that every footstep causes our coats to rub together and the sound of friction suddenly seems so loud in the vastness. The opera was you taking me to your sacred place, and this, I realise, is me taking you to mine.

I wonder if you feel as out of place here as I did at the opera. I turn to catch you looking at me and I know that on some level I am right; you’re here just for me.

It’s ridiculous. I laugh. The moisture in my breath curls up into the sky until it disappears. “What are we doing?”

“Going for a walk, I believe.”

You’re being purposefully obtuse but I let you have it. There probably isn’t a word for what we are. I curl my fingers around the fabric of your coat that gathers in the crook of your elbow and I let you change the conversation.

 

I get a call. It’s early. I scramble for the phone, unseating a couple of the dogs that show their disapproval with tired barks and sniffles, and after all that, I discover that it’s an unknown voice on an unknown number.

“Is this Will Graham?”

I grunt. It’s the most I can manage at - what is this? 4:13 in the morning - _god_.

“Mr Graham, you’re listed as the emergency contact for Dr Hannibal Lecter.”

I am suddenly wide awake. I am searching the room for any wearable clothes before I can even process the fact that I am apparently your _emergency contact_ and wonder how long that’s been in play.

“What happened? Is he okay?” I try to keep the panic out of my voice but I can feel myself failing. It’s _you_. If it were anyone else it would be drunk driving and the need to pick you up from the station, or an accident at home and you’d been taken to the ER, but it’s _you_. This call could be anything from those sorts of trivialities to “oh, hey, we’ve finally realised he’s the Chesapeake Ripper” to… oh, I can’t even imagine what. I can’t think of anything insane enough to imagine what kind of trouble you could be in and that’s with _my_ vivid imagination.

“There was an attempt on his life.”

And, yeah, okay, that _is_ insane enough.

I drive to the hospital through thick snow and relentless thoughts and by the time I’m at your bedside, I don’t even remember how I got there.

You look weak and it terrifies me. There’s so many tubes going into you - drip, blood, waste - that you look like one of your art pieces. I can’t help the sob that escapes me but I manage to block some of the noise with my gloved hand. When did I genuinely start to care for you? I should be happy for the sight of you in pain after all you’ve done, but I’m not; it _wrecks_ me. What have you done to me? That I care for a monster?

It doesn’t matter, I tell myself. Whatever is to blame, I care. And you need me.

The doctors say that a patient stabbed you. Psychopaths attract psychopaths, we are proof enough of that. I hope you saw it coming. I hope you got your recompense.

There are cops loitering around the hallway outside and it won’t be long until Jack is here. I don’t even know what our relationship is, yet alone how we should define it to outsiders. I should be gone before he arrives. I will allow myself two minutes, no more.

I close the door firmly behind me and make my way to your bedside.

I brush the hair from your forehead and let my fingers linger on your cheek. I could press my lips against your skin but I don’t know if it would be welcome even if you were awake. I tell myself it would be much too melodramatic in any case and pick up your hand instead.

My stomach is a twisted mess of anxiety. I know that you’ll be okay; you’ve survived worse than this, but… I still hate to see you so weak. No one has the right to wreck you so utterly. No one. _But me_ , my mind argues, _If anyone gets to gut you, it should be me_.

You wake as I rub my thumb against the inside of your palm. Your eyelids flutter open and you look at me with admiration. But it’s different than usual. More open. No. An absence of something. And then, I realise with a bloom of warmth beneath my chest, that it’s the guardedness, the _inquisitiveness_ that’s missing; you’re not trying to unravel me as you love me; you are simply loving me.

It’s the drugs, I assure myself, making your brain as sluggish as melted snow. I tell myself this because I can’t let myself believe that you feel for me as much as I do for you. I can’t admit that I’m drowning. (But I am, oh god, I am).

“Hey,” I whisper. It comes out too broken for my liking. I cough, turn away, and try again. “Heard you got stabbed.”

“‘Tis but a scratch,” you croak and I have to break my hand from yours to cover my hysterical laughter. God, what’s wrong with us?

You smile at me, and there’s a little more life behind the adoration in your eyes. “Thank you for coming.”

“Of course,” I say, and this time it’s your hand that inches towards mine on the bedsheets. Your fingers brush against mine; a simple point of contact.

“What happened to the person who did this to you?” I ask, and I look into your eyes as I do so, so you would see that I would kill them if you had not.

“I believe-” Your eyes flicker to the window of the hospital door, to the shadows of the cops beyond, before falling back to me. “I believe that the poor fellow was killed as I tried to defend myself.”

 _Of course_. I’m proud. I’m relieved. I feel a thousand impossible things as I press my lips against your forehead and leave them there until I feel your fingers tightening their grip in mine.

 

You are released from hospital far too early, probably because you terrify the staff, and so for the first week that you’re home, you can barely move.

I take to sleeping on the couch in your room. I told myself it was because you might need me in the night - to fetch you medication or water or a blanket - but it was also because I didn’t want to let you out of my sight. You were weak and wounded and I knew there would be some psychopath out there who would want to finish the job.

If you saw the gun by my makeshift bed, you didn’t comment on it. An amazing feat considering that you commented on almost _everything else_.

You don’t like to be mollycoddled, I get it, but when I come back from the grocery store on the fourth day to see you collapsed on the stairs, in an exhausted sweaty heap, I want to shout at you like an overworked mother.

“What are you doing?” I ask tiredly as I pick you up. It’s easier than it should be; you’ve become too lithe while bedridden. You’re dressed in long pyjamas and a silk dressing gown, and bizarrely, it looks like a softened version of your usual attire. You haven’t bathed since you’ve come home though; your hair is lanky with grease and you smell stale like the used bandages wrapped around your stomach.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t tear the stitches,” you tell me as your arm comes around my shoulders and I leverage us to standing.

Before I can reply with a sarcastic comment that would probably lead to a passive aggressive comment about my nurturing abilities, you’re telling me: “Wrong way.”

I grit my teeth. “You’re going back to bed.”

“No, you’re taking me to the kitchen.”

I clench my jaw and stare at you defiantly. “You’re in no state to be cooking, Hannibal.”

“Which is why you shall be doing the cooking, dear Will. Actual cooking. Not whatever microwaveable delight you had planned to surprise me with tonight.”

This time, my hand clenches. I’m rapidly running out of body parts I can feed my anger into. It would be so much easier if I could just push you down the fucking stairs.

Your fingers gently caress my clenched hand, and I sigh, knowing that I’ve lost the argument. “Fine.”

We set up a chair in the corner of the kitchen and I begin to cook for you. You walk me through a basic soup dish and even though my vegetables are chopped haphazardly and I fumble with the presentation, you never once criticise my methods. It’s nice, actually. When you’re not instructing me, you’re watching me; contentedly humming classical music under your breath with a soft smile on your face. It’s the first time in four days that you’ve actually looked happy and not like I’m one wrong move away from being your next supper.

It felt too constricting in that one room. Here, in your kitchen, we can finally talk without frustration lining every word.

“I know why I cared so deeply for Abigail,” you are saying, as we eat from the bowls in our hands. You are still sat in the chair and I perch on a stool nearby. It’s like a mockery of our ‘conversations’ but with you in pyjamas and a chance for me to mull over answers between mouthfuls of soup.

“Your sister,” I infer. We have talked about Mischa a little since our honesty agreement but I have never pried for details. “You felt the need to protect Abigail in the way you couldn’t protect your sister. It’s probably the same pathology that drove you to eventually kill Abigail Hobbs. You are driven to protect them up until the point that you need to protect yourself.”

You are studying me, I can feel it. One of these days I think I will go too far and tell you something about yourself that you will consider unforgivable. You smile. “Yes. But why did _you_ care for her?”

“Are you asking me to analyse my own pathology? You’re probably in a better position to do that, doctor.”

“Perhaps. But I want to hear what you think.”

“I think…” I exhale. I put down the bowl on the worktop beside me to give me an extra few seconds to formulate my answer. “I think the reason why I cared for Abigail is the same reason why I have seven strays waiting for me at home and the same reason why I asked you to change your motive.”

The addition of the last comment brings a smile to your lips. “You believe you can take things from dark places and make them light again. You loved Abigail because you felt responsible for making her an orphan and you wanted to care for her, in much the same way that you nurture your dogs back to health. The way that you are nurturing me,” you look away as you say this. “You’re a pathological fixer, Will Graham. Are you trying to bring me into the light as well?”

“No,” I say with certainty. I asked you to minimise the loss, not because of what it would mean for you, but because of the victims and their families. Because I have an empathy disorder which means I cannot separate my feelings from the murders as you can. I did it to make _myself_ lighter. Not you. Never you. “I don’t want to make you lighter,” I explain. “You don’t need fixing, Hannibal, that’s not what this is for me.”

You close your eyes. Your tongue licks at your lower lip. For a minute, I think you’re not going to be brave enough to ask. When you look back up to me, your pupils are blown wider and the darkness pours straight into my own. “So what is this for you?”

My breath catches. You look away. And I think, even if I did have an answer, that you may not be ready to hear it.

 

That evening, I bathe you. You let me undress you and lower you into the empty tub. It is a vulnerability I never thought you’d let me see but there’s a surreal calmness that has washed over us since our conversation in the kitchen. I let you change your own bandages as I trail a wet sponge over your skin. My touch isn’t as clinical as perhaps it ought to be but you don’t reprimand me when my hand stays a fraction too long on your naked shoulder.

You don’t let me shave you but I sit beside you and watch your steady hands as they move across your jaw and I tell you about how I found Mabel, the oldest of my dogs, and it’s almost as intimate. Afterwards, I wash your hair, and it’s as I’m lathing the conditioner through your hair, gently scratching my fingernails across your scalp, that I realise this is probably the most I’ve ever been permitted to touch you.

You’re unnaturally malleable under my hands as I lead you back to bed and dress you in freshly pressed pyjamas. It’s as if the simple act of cooking has made you pliable.

I lower you into bed with your arms wrapped around my neck and our gentle descent into the horizontal. It occurs to me that I made love to a woman like this once. Carried her to the bed and laid her flat like this. We were naked, but strangely, it didn’t feel nearly as intimate as this does with you now.

I have helped you to bed several times over this last week but now without the friction of unspoken frustration pushing between us like opposing magnets, I realise just how close the action brings us. I can feel the heat between our bodies as we lie, fully lowered, onto the bed. I pause. I ought to move away, but then again, your hands haven’t moved from my neck either. You’re not holding me in place, but you’re not suggesting I let go either. You’re always so curious to see what I’ll do next.

Your face is so close to mine that I can feel your breath against my cheek.

My eyelids flutter in response.

I have been shying away from intimate contact in these last weeks, unsure of its meaning. There was that first kiss in your kitchen that was my doing; that quick press of lips what feels like a lifetime ago; that impulsive action that went ignored by you. But since, the lingering touches you give me, the squeeze of your fingers, the feel of your hand in mind… these gentle signs of affections that go against your very nature, yet, at the same time feel wholly in character. You touch me like I’m more precious than the rarest jewels but you rarely let me touch you in return.

Except for tonight.

Tonight, when I have been allowed to cook for you, and bathe you, and hold you in my arms. And I am emboldened to push a little further for once, to dare show you my affection in return.

I tilt my head just slightly, just enough to make our lips brush and set my insides alight like firecrackers. I feel your fingers on the back of my neck twitch, and then slide milimetres into the back of my hair. My eyes fall shut as I take your bottom lip between mine, your lips still open a little in surprise; a naturally formed kiss. I’m so gentle with you, as gentle as you have been with me, as my teeth brush your lip and I nip so delicately that it could hardly be considered movement at all. I feel your sigh more than hear it as you respond, your lips closing around mine, your fingers curling in my hair. I begin to move my lips over yours, so slowly that I feel every slight catch of nerve endings between us. It’s the slowest kiss I’ve ever had, and the most sensual. It burns a fire within me, so deep and so consuming, that it takes every effort to keep the movements chaste. I feel at once both like melting and flaring out of control, my chest aching with the sweetness and my hardness aching for more. I cradle your face in my hands as I kiss you, and I press my chest as close as I can to yours, chasing the heat of your skin.

I want to crawl inside you.

Your hands slip from my shoulders in a request for me to stop. It’s as if you can sense my thoughts and my traitorous body wanting more than you can give me. Our kiss lasted only for a few seconds but I feel it in my bones; your soul in my body fusing the broken parts together with the twisted dark coil of burning metal. I move my lips to your cheek, your temple, your forehead… delaying the inevitable as the fire inside calms.

I rise then, onto my arms, and look down upon you. Your eyes are still closed, your face relaxed in bliss, and your mouth still parted ever so slightly. I could kiss you again. I don’t know when you will let me do so again. But, I do not want to try your patience.

I let myself up and get ready to leave for my makeshift bed in the corner of the room when your hand comes to curl around my wrist. “Will,” you say, and it sounds so loud after the small divinity we just shared, “perhaps tomorrow night, you will do me the honour of sleeping beside me.”

I smile at you, and it probably looks as sappy as it feels. You don’t mean for sex, I know that, but I wonder if you’d let me hold you; if you’d let me feel your heartbeat against my own.

 

You do not permit being held, I discover the next night, but I do get to lay my hand on your arm, and the following morning you wake me with a delicate press of your lips to my fingertips.

 

Academically, I know that you - a psychopath - must experience emotion differently from others. But sometimes I attempt to categorise your feelings anyway, as if I can morph the little insights you give me into a broad emotion that I can understand.

Guilt, for instance.

I’ve concluded that you don’t feel guilty about killing people. On the whole, the people you kill are not good people - at least, not by your definition - they’re mundane, or rude, or attempting to kill us. And on the large scale of things, you hardly make a dent in the population. But by killing them, you make their deaths - and therefore their lives - _glorious_. You purify them with your cooking, savour them with your lips, transform their bodies into an art form that will be admired by countless eyes. You transcend them.

You are, simply put, doing them a favour, and so it doesn’t occur to you to feel guilty for the work that you do.

But I also suspect that the closest you may have been is when you killed Abigail Hobbs. Not because of the action itself - the mechanics of murder are much the same regardless of the victim - but because you recognised within her a similar chrysalis to the one that you saw within me. But instead of nurturing it, you chose to destroy it, and the more details you reveal to me, the more I think that you didn’t want to kill her at all. I think you may even regret it. I think you decided to kill Abigail only to save the other, in your mind, more promising creation. (Me.)

Abigail _interested_ you and now you have deprived yourself from ever seeing what would have emerged. For a minute, I think you believed it. You, me, her. And what a twisted nightmare of a family we would have been. But it also would have been the only family that either of us would have known. Regardless of whether you loved her, you must have realised when you killed her that you had also disposed of the fascinating puzzle within her.

Is that what made you change your mind about me? If you had me locked away for her murder like you had planned then you would have been left with no puzzles at all. Safe, but alone.

You may be a psychopath, Hannibal, but I think you still feel loneliness. (Or, again, not loneliness as I feel it - frosty fields, three days without speaking, empty beer bottles on the windowsill, a single pillow, and dogs whimpering into the night - but the feeling you experience that has closest resemblance to loneliness.)

I remind myself of this when you turn up at my office with a ridiculous European delicacy that I can’t pronounce and probably cost more than the entire contents of my kitchen cupboards. You’re trying to apologise for your past actions, to romance me, and to thank me for looking after you, all with a single box of tupperware and a meek expression.

You wouldn’t be a psychologist if you didn’t understand how others felt. You understand, academically, that you can make it better with a visit to the farmer’s market and three hours in the kitchen. The press of your leg against mine as we share lunch also feels calculated, as does the hand that rests over mine as you say goodbye, but unlike everything else, I can’t work out the logic for these touches.

Do you think I’m afraid to get any closer to you? I am, a little. I never thought I would want a man like I want you, but if our relationship had become something you did not want it to be, I know you would have set it to rights. So why do I sense that you are reluctant to move forward?

 

I wake from another nightmare and see you standing at the foot of my bed. It takes several moments to recognise that you are not a hallucination and even then I am not entirely convinced.

I sit hunched under the blankets, sweat cooling on my brow as you come into focus. Most of the dogs are still sleeping but the curious Buster comes to nudge his wet nose against your legs and it’s only when you crouch to pet him that I am assured of your physicality.

“I am sorry for invading your home like this. I apologise if I startled you.” You rise once again, leaving Buster forlorn behind you, and cross the room towards me.

Mabel mews her greeting as you perch on my bed but once you’ve acknowledged her she puts her head back on her paws and goes back to sleep.

I rub my hand over my face to cover my sigh. I don’t mind your presence - your _invasion_ \- as much as I should. “Why are you here?” I croak, my voice thick with sleep.

Your hand reaches over the blanket to stroke my leg. An unusual touch from an unusual man.

“I shouldn’t be here,” you say, avoiding the question. “I am not usually so careless, making social calls with a body in the trunk of my car, but-”

I rub my eyes, the last remnants of sleep disappearing with the mention of murder.

“-I thought you might wish to contribute to the presentation.”

This is so surreal. And surreally romantic that you’d ask. Your hand is resting atop the blanket and this time I do not stop myself from lacing my fingers through yours. Warm. I used to expect a killer’s hands to be cold. I know better now.

A part of me wants those hands closer; for the fabric to dissolve under our touch. The curl of desire in my gut has become a regular part of our interactions now. Has it always been there for you? Why do you resist acting upon it?

I allow myself to look into your eyes and I see too much. It’s always too much. It is a mirror, I know that, but it doesn’t explain why I am still overwhelmed by the sight. Unless... Unless, you are the one that’s alive in this twisted metaphor, and I am the one trapped in the reflection; only alive when you look at me; when you ask things of me, like this. I feel more alive in the seconds I look into your eyes than I do at any other time when you are away.

The heat within me blooms as I hold your gaze and ask you to tell me about the victim.

I can step into your mind so easily now. Suggesting ways for you to display the body is like a crime scene in reverse. And this time it will be by _our_ design.

You took another suicidal victim again, and together, we design an appropriate end for him, but - “The FBI are going to notice the pattern,” I inform you. “They’ll put it together if we don’t help them go in another direction. I could suggest we have a copycat. Someone who wishes to win your affections.”

You mull this over and then stroke my knuckles with your thumb. “Perhaps that is for the best. This is a different man after all.”

Are you’re telling me that I’ve changed you? Or telling me that the murder is my own design? Regardless, of course those we kill together will appear different to those you killed before you met me. We are becoming one, after all.

Your smile is so indulgent when you lean over and kiss my forehead. I want to hold you in place. I want to claim your lips until my tongue tastes blood. I want to push you to the bed and lose hours in you.

But, you pull away.

“Will you be joining me?” you ask, and for a crazy, hopeless moment, I think that the words belong to me; that it’s me, inviting you into bed with me.

I want you. I want you more than I’ve wanted anyone, but I wonder if it’s simply because you are denying me it. I wonder if this is another of your mind games; unable to manipulate me as you used to, you have found enjoyment in other ways, in tormenting me with affection to the point of frustration…

I chase the thoughts away and realise the actual meaning of your question: You are asking me to mutilate a corpse in the same polite tone that you use to ask people to dinner.

I run my hands over your coat collar, as if I’m straightening it. I’m not. I just need an excuse to touch you a moment longer.

“Not this time,” I say, and there’s a promise there. _Next time_.

Your eyes brighten and you smile wider and for a second I believe that you’re going to kiss me the way I crave to be kissed... but then, you move away.

At the door, you turn back and ask, “Would you like dinner tomorrow night? Tenderised heart marinated in red wine.”

“Sounds perfect,” I tell you. We share a smile. I should let you go but now I have thought it, I have to ask. “Hannibal?” I call after you.

You are no more than a shadow in the doorway but by its stillness I know that you are listening.

“One of these nights… will you stay?” I ask.

I lick my lips in your silence, my mouth dry with nerves, and avert my eyes from the doorway where you stand. “Not that you have to,” I say hurriedly, “If you don’t want that, I understand, but I just want to know…”

I pick at the bedsheets, wishing for once that you would interrupt me. “Will you stay?” I try again, “One day?”

“Only when you’re certain.”

I look up. Your face is half-lit with moonlight, the other dark as a void. Stern.

I reply just as harshly, “I _am_ certain.”

You shake your head, slowly, as if you’re disappointed in me, and it only makes me angrier.

“I know what I want,” I bite.

The light catches your eyes and for a moment they look red. I look into the mirror of your mind and what I feel back is _raw_. “No, you don’t,” you say, and your fierce passion comes over me like a wave.

You want to stride across the room and stretch me across the bed until my ribs are bared. You want to pin my hands to the headboard until my wrists are rubbed red and claim my mouth until I’m gasping and the only air I’m permitted to breathe has come from your lungs. You want to tear my clothes and stuff your cock inside me until I am begging, crying, screaming. You want to bite me as I come and savour the taste of blood and semen on your tongue. You want to _devour_ me.

I come out of your mind with a gasp. My heart is pounding. My cock is heavy between my legs. I am exhilarated by both want and fear. You wouldn’t hurt me unless I wanted it, I know that, but it’s the last of my survival instincts making itself known. I lick my lips again. Your eyes return to their softer shade.

You _are_ holding back from me. But you’re doing it because you don’t want us to be a lie. You want us to be equals. When we’re together, finally, you want to be yourself - your whole self - with me. You have reasons to believe that I am not yet ready; that there is still a part of you I have not seen, or a part of myself that is yet to emerge from the chrysalis. I trust your judgement. Only you know what I don’t know.

“Okay,” I tell you. “I’ll wait.”

 

“I have a surprise for you,” you tell me one morning. I have become so accustomed to your lifestyle that I honestly expect the ‘surprise’ to be a body, or at least a body _part_. I don’t expect it to be a coffee house.

I look at the pretentious coffee bar, frequented by young men with beards and glasses and wonder if the ‘surprise’ is how somewhere so hipster has managed to emerge in such a shitty part of Baltimore.

“Why are we here, Hannibal?” I ask, exasperated, as you lead me to a table on the patio. The metal of the chair scrapes across the stone slabs as you pull it back for me. I hate this place. No one over the age of thirty-five likes metal chairs with no back support, and I wonder, judging by the clientele, if that was the idea.

Your nose wrinkles in distaste as you take your seat opposite me. You hate this place too. You pick up the menu with its cursive script and hand it to me. It’s just about as indecipherable as I had anticipated.

“Next time just buy me another pen I don’t need,” I tell you.

You smile. You can probably even see the outline of the pen you bought me in my jacket pocket, the infinity symbol tucked close to my chest.

“This isn’t your gift,” you say.

“Then what-?” I begin to ask, but then the waitress appears and I let it drop. Of course this is the type of place with table service. Table service, for _coffee_.

I shake my head and look back at the stupid menu. “Just, er, black coffee, please,” I say, trying to push the menu into the girl’s hands.

“Certainly, sir.”

I jar at the voice.

I look at the hands that took the menu. Pale skin. Petite. A little blue band-aid wrapped around a finger. No jewelry. Clean nails. I steel myself and move my eyes upwards. White pinafore. Olive green blouse. Dainty necklace. Pierced ears. Dark brown hair, but pinned back, not as I am used to seeing it.

 _Abigail_.

_It’s Abigail._

But it’s not her. It can’t be. You killed her. And now she’s asking for your order with the fake courteous smile that’s mandatory for the service industry. I don’t know what either of you say in the exchange because I am standing in Hobbs’ kitchen.

When I come back, you’re watching me, patiently.

“I know,” you say on a soft sigh. “It took me by surprise also. It is not her, I can assure you, though the likeness is uncanny.”

I nod, numbly. I am still reeling. I ought to be angry that your idea of a surprise is to give me flashbacks to our child that you murdered, but instead, as I watch the waitress - Kate - make our drinks behind the counter, I let the edges blur until it becomes Abigail. Happy. Safe. Living a mundane life of coffee and chatter. Maybe studying. Living with friends. Seeing us at the weekend.

Another life.

I look back to you and it’s the closest expression to sadness that I have ever seen. It’s directed at me, I know, not the girl. You pity me because I still care; you want to heal the wound that you made.

I return to watching the girl, but as she’s gathering the drinks onto a tray, a man grasps her wrist and pulls her to face him. She winces from the movement but he doesn’t seem to apologise. He lowers his lips to her ear and says something that makes her service smile crack. She seems to shrink into herself, her self-esteem lost to reveal a withdrawn, depressed woman beneath. It doesn’t take me long to reach a conclusion.

I feel my jaw clench in anger. “He’s abusing her.”

“Yes.”

The man loosens his grip, laughs, and kisses her on the cheek. Boyfriend, most likely, but also a colleague. When she approaches with our drinks, her service mask is back in place, but now I have seen underneath, I can see the tiredness in her eyes, the slump of her shoulders, and the long sleeves of the blouse that might strategically hide bruises.

You thank her by name.

“How many times have you come here?” I ask.

“Enough to know the nature of the things he says to her. They are not at all pleasant.”

“And you haven’t done anything?”

“Emotional abuse is very difficult to prove in court.”

“Bullshit. You’re a respected psychologist. All you’d have to do is sign a letter and the authorities would keep him away from her.”

“Perhaps. And then he would find another young woman to torment. It hardly seems like a permanent solution.”

I suddenly know exactly where this little outing is heading. What exactly your permanent solution is. I look over my coffee cup at you as I take a sip. You look positively gleeful.

“Is this a test?” I ask.

“That depends...” you say, as you circle the rim of your tall glass with a finger. “What do you think I’m testing?”

I huff. You are ridiculous. We both know we’re talking about murder.

I look until I find the abuser talking to a male customer inside the cafe, sniggering at something on a computer screen, and with enough hair gel between them to open a salon. I let myself see him as you would see him and a righteous anger courses through me; a hunger to see this beast slaughtered.

“You know I will agree,” I tell you. “But you think the reason I will give for doing so is to protect Kate, because she reminds me of Abigail, because it is my second chance to save her, and because I am a ‘pathological fixer,’” I quote back at you. “But,” I say, dropping my voice, “the reason why I will strip the flesh from his bones and unravel his brain with my bare hands and pry open his chest until his heart is splayed open and beaten raw like his victims is because that guy-” I say, as the abuser slicks back his hair and laughs, “is an asshole.”

By the time I’m done, I’m pretty sure you’re hiding an erection the size of the Eiffel Tower in your pants. Your mouth is slightly agape and your eyes are sparkling like a child in wonder. You lick your lips and then a toothy smile emerges, and I know that I have surpassed whatever test it was that you set for me.

 

Christmas sneaks up on me as it does every year. It’s not until you open your door to me one evening and I see a tastefully decorated tree behind you that I even realise it’s December. We’ve been busy planning the execution of the abuser, and busy evading the FBI, that trivial things like the _holidays_ have escaped my notice.

Right on the heels of this realisation, comes another one that terrifies me: I’m going to have to get you a present. What do you buy the psychiatrist-slash-boyfriend-slash-murder-partner who has everything? I’ve no idea.

When the third week of the dreaded month arrives I’m so desperate for ideas that I’m considering going out and killing someone just so I can give you their organs. But we have plans and it would be rude to kill ahead of schedule. It’s not the murder or the meat that you’d want anyway; you just want to watch me do it. It’s possible that you’d kill me, literally, for killing without you.

Instead, I opt for another one of your hobbies: music.

I find a cathedral a couple of hours away that is putting on a performance of Handel’s _Messiah_ on Christmas Eve. As the days approach, I oscillate between thinking that this is a great idea and thinking that is an absolutely _terrible_ idea doomed to failure.

By the time I pull up to your house on Christmas Eve, as snow falls and the afternoon fades, I have sweated through my shirt with anxiety. I rub my hands over my face, straighten the tie you gave me, and with trepidation, grab the poinsettias from the seat beside me.

“Ready?” I ask, when you open the door.

“Yes. Though I do wish you had disclosed the nature of our engagement tonight. How else will I know that I’m wearing the right pocket square?”

When you take the festive flowers from between us, I see that there’s a smile on your face. You have the stupidest sense of humour. I look though, and laugh despite myself. You’re wearing a red dotted pocket square with your navy plaid suit. It matches the tie I’m wearing perfectly and I have to wonder, firstly, how predictable I am that you knew I’d wear your present from last month, and secondly, whether you actually bought a matching accessory when you bought it for me.

“You look good,” I tell you, with a crooked smile.

“Likewise, Mr Graham,” you say as you put the flowers on a table inside. “Shall we?”

You never mention the state of my car - the mud and dog hair all over the upholstery and the unkemptness that belongs solely to me - but you always use your trench coat as a barrier when you sit down. I don’t comment on it, just as I don’t ask when Chopin’s Preludes and Beethoven’s Sonatas found their way into my CD collection. It’s nice though, the combination of my car and your music; these things that used to be paradoxical now working in harmony.

We arrive in the idyllic town almost two hours before the concert. I had planned as such because, in a moment of bravery, I had also booked a restaurant for dinner.

“I once had a client who lived here,” is all you say about the town as we walk around in the light snow. “But I never had a reason to visit. There didn’t appear to be much here.”

There isn’t. There were precisely three restaurants to choose from: Thai, Italian and East-European. I had chosen the European one - it had the best reviews and I thought it might have some food you recognised from your childhood - but then, as we approach, I realise my colossal mistake: _your childhood_.

 _Yes,_ I scold myself, _bring the psychopath to the restaurant that’s most likely to remind him of his traumatic childhood. Great thinking, Graham._

I look across to gauge your reaction but before I can issue any apologises I hear you muttering, “I wonder if they serve…” and then you’re darting into the restaurant.

It’s good food, luckily. I let you do the ordering but I foot the bill. We share a bottle of red, you feed me a spoonful of your stew, and you take a slice of my kielbasa. Then we split a Polish cheesecake for dessert and by the time we’ve finished, you’ve nearly finished lecturing me about the dozen different types of European sausages and their various histories.

I realise, during the second glass of wine, that I’ve had this stupid smile on my face the whole time. It’s because we’re having one of those moments that feels _normal_ \- like when you’re taking me round the farmer’s market, or when you’re out walking the dogs with me - not “normal” in the fake way that it used to be, but normal in the sense of _our normal._ This isn’t an act. I know the things you do in the basement, you know the things in my mind, but between all the insane parts of our life, I also get this quiet, steady, companionship; a warm presence in my life that I never thought I would have.

You break off mid-description and tilt your head at me. “You’ve gone somewhere else.” You’re not mad; you simply state what you have observed.

I smile softly. “Sorry. I was just thinking about how… grateful I am.” I shake my head. “And how I’ve clearly had too much wine.”

I hurry you out of the restaurant before my sentimentally gets too embarrassing but your hand pressed against the small of my back feels like a ‘thank you’ anyway.

You’re leading me back towards the car, I realise. “Not yet,” I tell you, as I take your gloved hand in mine and tug you in the right direction.

“A church?” you ask.

I don’t answer but as we approach I watch you read the sign for the concert outside and your entire body seems to light up in response. It’s ridiculous but it’s only in that moment that it suddenly feels like Christmas.

When I see your crow’s feet crinkle and your lips curve I think, _I love you_ , so loud and so clear, that the only terrifying part is that it doesn’t come as a revelation; it comes as if I’ve always known.

You’re still staring at the sign and I let you take your time. Eventually, you tell me, “When I was a child, Mischa and I walked for miles to the Christmas service. She was young and could barely walk; I had to carry her most of the way. We arrived, freezing, starving, and trailing melting snow down the nave, but… it is one of my happiest memories. The warmth. The music. The choir was no more than a few villagers but they sang the Hallelujah Chorus and I cried it was so beautiful.”

“If it’s too much, Hannibal, we don’t have to-”

You square your jaw and shake your head minutely. “No. It is a very thoughtful present and it would be a pleasure to experience it again, with you.”

You are being so open with me tonight that I soften in response. I spend much of the concert watching you, as I did the last time, but I catch myself sometimes, closing my eyes to take in the beauty of the music, or watching the musicians strike their notes in perfect harmony. You have given me an understanding for music that I have never had before. You haven’t just given me your darkness, I realise, you’ve given me your beauty too.

The drive home is silent and peaceful. The stars are so full in the sky that you cannot even make out constellations. I’ve never seen you so content. It’s that glimpse I caught when I was cooking for you in your kitchen, and that soft proud smile you have when we’re planning murder, but lengthened and amplified until the very air of the car seems to be humming with happiness.

I walk you to your door as it’s approaching midnight. Your coat is folded over one arm and snowflakes are melting in your hair.

“Thank you,” you say softly. You cup my cheek and for a moment, do nothing but watch me, before leaning in and pressing your lips against mine. I’m reminded of the kiss we shared when you were ill - it’s just as slow, and gentle, and certainly the longest we’ve shared thus far - but the guardedness isn’t there this time. It’s chaste, not because you’re holding back, but because, tonight, you are simple as fragile as the kiss suggests.

I sigh into the kiss and press myself into the warmth of your breath and the bulk of our winter coats. When you pull away, it feels like you don’t want to pull away at all. We’re still sharing the same air; the paths of our exhales tangle between us.

You close your eyes as your thumb moves across my jaw. You want to invite me in.

“I can stay,” I offer. “If you want me too. Alana can check on the dogs -”

“Then they’ll know.”

“They already know. They’re only keeping quiet because they’re afraid we’ll kill them.”

I jar. It’s uncomfortably close to the truth.

I shake my head with a cringe. “Sorry. Ruined the mood.”

“On the contrary,” you say, and I look up and find another stupid smile on your face. Jesus, you need to get yourself a better sense of humour.

I huff and break your gaze, looking to the holly wreath on the door. “Okay, well, I don’t have to -”

“How about a nightcap?” you offer, but that smile says I’ll be staying for longer than a drink.

An hour later, we crawl into bed with our bellies warm with whiskey and you kiss me until I feel the warmth in my toes. There’s none of the fierce passion I saw in your eyes the other night in my bedroom, but I can also tell that you’re not hiding away, that your darkness is there, simmering in the distance of your mind.

I fall asleep, eventually, early on Christmas morning, to your gentle breath against my lips and the palm of your hand resting on my back. During the night, I move, until I am wrapped around you, holding you fully in my arms.

 

When I wake in the morning, I am alone. I am not surprised; we will both need our distance after such closeness.

I pad downstairs in the silk pyjamas I borrowed from you and find you, not in the kitchen where I expected, but instead, standing in front of the Christmas tree in your lounge. You’re drinking coffee and staring at the lights in an almost trance-like state.

I am debating whether or not to interrupt when you turn and greet me with a smile, “Good morning, Will.”

I clear the sleep from my throat and return the greeting, coming to stand beside you. You offer me your coffee and I gratefully take a sip before passing it back.

“I’m afraid I wasn’t expecting you today. Your present is elsewhere. If you’d like a drive this morning, I can take you to it.”

I should have considered your careful phrasing but I only become curious when you pull into a marina. A feeling of dread builds as we exit the car and you lead me down a walkway towards…

“Please tell me you did not buy me a _boat_.”

You at least have the decency to look embarrassed.

“A boat?!” I exclaim. It’s not exactly a small one either. I jump up onto it and dart around inspecting it, and when I walk out of the cabin, I repeat my exclamation. There’s an entire living area beneath the deck. It’s a brand new model. I know boats. I know what it would have cost. “You can’t buy me a boat for Christmas, Hannibal, it’s insane.”

You look at me with amusement.

“Yes! _Insane_ ,” I emphasise, but I genuinely don’t know if I’m angry about it or not.

I start pacing the deck. I run my hands through my hair and look to the sky in exasperation, hands on my hips. Then, the whole thing hits me again and I have to stop in my tracks. “Holy shit,” I mutter in awe, “You’ve actually found something crazier than eating people.”

I breathe out, long and hard. You’re still annoyingly silent.

I rub my hand over my eyes in frustration and try to explain it again, “Okay. We’ve been doing this is for… what? Four months? We’re not at _boat-buying_ levels of commitment. That’s crazy. I don’t want that. Okay?”

I’m so worked up that I almost miss the minute expression that crosses your face.

“Oh, shit,” I say. “I didn’t mean -”

I groan, and come and sit beside you on the lip of the boat.

“It’s not that I don’t… You know that I’m...” I trail off again, and let my attempts to clarify our relationship disappear into the ocean air. Then I remember the infinity pen you gave me and it gives me the confidence to say what you need to hear. “I know a part of you still believes that I’m only here because we are tied to each other by circumstance, or maybe somewhere deep down, you still think I’m playing you somehow.” I take a deep breath and force myself to look into your fierce eyes. “But I’m not, Hannibal. That’s not what this is for me. I _want_ to be here.”

I wait until you look at me to tell you the most important thing.

“Hannibal, I’m _all in_.”

You study me. I can feel you reaching into my mind to check I’m not lying to you. I stroke my fingers over your hand until I’ve sensed that you believe me.

“I want this, I do. But please also understand that buying me a boat is crazy.”

I feel your little laugh in my chest like it’s my own. You tilt your head and cock your eyebrow in your stubborn way of relenting.

“Would it make you feel better if I said that the boat was for the both of us?”

“No,” I say honestly. “I think that’s a different kind of terrifying.”

You smile. “Understandable. The boat is yours, but when the time comes…”

“Oh,” I say with realisation. I look around, suddenly re-assessing the boat in a new light. “It’s your escape plan.” The specs are good for that too.

You look down at your hands. “The crows are circling ever nearer to me. It won’t be long until they uncover the truth. I altered my plan accordingly when I incorporated you. I do not wish for you to feel pressured to join me, Will, but in time, suspicions will fall to you too, as the copycat if nothing else.”

“‘The sympathetic copycat who wishes to win your affections,’” I repeat back from when we planned how to display the last body. “You’re right. If they know you and I are together then…”

“It would be a logical conclusion for them to make.”

I stand up and look out over the bow. “I’d like to say I didn’t know what I was getting into when I agreed to cover up Abigail’s death with you, but I did.” I glance over my shoulder at you as I confess, “I know what I am… what I’ve become, and I don’t regret it. It’s brought me closer to you and you’ve shown me how beautiful it is; life, death… art. You’ve shown me what it’s like to be understood. To be seen. And so, when we take this boat together, I won’t be taking it to escape. I’ll be taking it to be with you.”

It may have been you who was emotional last night, but apparently, today is my turn. Tears prick my eyes but it’s easy to pretend that it’s the cold wind that burns them. I hear you approach behind me and I don’t need to look any more; I no longer fear that you will hurt me. Here, on a quiet morning, in a deserted marina, you could kill me. But I know that you won’t, at least, not like this. Instead, I feel your hand resting between my shoulder blades, as you look out over the marina with me.

“Merry Christmas, Will.”

And your lips press against my cheek.

 

On New Year’s Eve we drive out to the wilderness where we know the abuser, Chris Thompson, will arrive early the next day. We hide the car in an abandoned barn and then walk to our chosen location with the supplies we will need for the hunt under our arms.

Despite the cold, we had decided to camp. You would have prefered to stay in a nearby cabin but it would have required payment that could be traced back to us. Sheltering in the barn would also have left too many clues for the authorities to find. Outside though… outside, the snow will cover our tracks not even an hour after we leave.

“It is a shame we are not here for longer,” you muse, crouching over me to pour hot tea into the camping mug I hold out to you. “I’ve been informed that the fish are numerous and resplendent. I imagine you’d enjoy it very much.”

There’s something familiar in your voice that makes my mind stumble until it reaches a conclusion. “You’ve seen me fishing before. You’ve _watched_ me.”

Your eyes flicker to mine, briefly, before you pick up the pot once again and pour tea into the second cup. “Yes.”

You know how much it frustrates me when you don’t elaborate because I know you do it only so you can hear me beg for answers. You have such an overwhelming god complex sometimes. I fight the urge to roll my eyes and ask, “Why?”

“You told me once that the river is where you go in your mind, your proverbial “happy place”, I wanted to see it.”

“I don’t remember telling you that.”

“No, I imagine that you wouldn’t.”

The encephalitis. I close my eyes and do my best not to get mad.

It doesn’t work.

My jaw is still clenched when you sit beside me on the log; your knee touching ever so slightly against mine.

“I am sorry for that,” you say, and I open my eyes only because it sounded like you meant it. “Truly. If I had known you would have been my ally then those measures would have been unnecessary but, you have to understand, I have survived for so long precisely because I work alone. The lengths to which I went, and would have gone, to frame you were for self-preservation, not any ill-feeling on your behalf.”

I nod. I understand. I know your mind so well it may as well be my own. We are long past the time for apologies but I appreciate you explaining all the same. Instead I ask, “When? When did you watch me?” but as soon as I ask, the answer comes to me, “It was when you made me those fishing lures, wasn’t it? You wanted to see if I knew what they were made of and would use them anyway.”

“Partly.”

I turn towards you. Your eyes flare red like the fire and I am captivated. I whisper, “What was the other part?”

You smile as if you’re amused by your own answer, “To see you happy.”

You glance at me and I wonder if it weren’t for the dark if I’d see red on your cheeks as well as your eyes. I duck my head, drink the tea, and when I look back, you are watching the fire once more.

You elaborate sometime later but your confessions are so quiet that I can barely hear them above the crackling kindling. “I did not know, then, if you returned my affections. I did not know if, despite our efforts, I might one day have to take your life to save mine. I did not know if you would ever forgive me... In short, I feared that I would never have the chance to see you truly at peace, though I longed to see it. I thought seeing you happy might make me lose my hold on you. Convince myself that you were happy as you were, without my interference, and allow me to step away.”

“You stepped closer instead.”

“Because what I saw wasn’t peacefulness, Will. There was still turmoil inside you, I could sense it, like a dormant snake nestled between your lungs. Sometimes when I was with you, I would catch glimpses of what lay within and saw how beautiful it was, if only you allowed it to surface. You would never be truly at peace with yourself until you accepted it. When I was watching you that day… I saw you with the lure I made, and in the moments you embraced what you were, you were more beautiful to me than anything I’d ever seen.” You smile softly at me and your fingers cup my cheek, your eyes full of admiration in a way I’d never seen before. “Tomorrow, I believe I might witness true beauty.”

My eyelids flutter close just before you kiss me. I have known for a long time that you desire to see me kill but only now do I understand the reasoning for it. You wish to see me happy. And tomorrow, when we take apart Chris Thompson, you may finally see the part of me that you’ve been longing for all these years.

I suddenly see the world as you see it - no black and white; only truth. I want to be my true self with you; all parts, light and dark. And I know you wish for the same. Equals. I remember what you told me at dinner long ago about sanity and madness, “Together we have eclipsed any such terms,” and I think you may be right.

I break the kiss but keep close to your warmth. “I was alone that weekend,” I realise. “You could have gutted me in that river and no one would have known. Tell me, how would you have done it?”

You seem pleasantly surprised by the question but it doesn’t take you long to respond. “Certainly not in the same way as Mr Thompson - no one deserves as much humiliation as we will give him come dawn - but the parallels between our location now and yours then are why you ask no doubt.”

I tilt my head on your shoulder in an affirmative. I’m oddly comfortable considering you are talking me through my hypothetical murder but this has become a juxtaposition of our relationship as of late; cosy nights spent in your living room, planning murder.

“My fantasies vary depending on the tools I would have at hand, the location, the time we would have, and, most importantly, the message I would want to portray. I have not thought about it for a long time but the last I did… I wanted your heart.”

“When you were trying to win my affections, I presume.”

“Yes.”

“Before that, it was my brain?”

You muse on this. “No. I wanted to study it, yes, I wanted to cut open your skull and watch your mind work in its marvellous ways but I never would have done you the dishonour of eating it. It was too… perfect. Unique.”

This bizarre sentiment makes me smile into the lapels of your coat like nothing else has. I feel your arm move around my shoulders, pulling me closer.

“Besides,” you tell me, “the meat is notoriously difficult to deal with.”

I hate your stupid sense of humour. I laugh and grab you by your ridiculous hat, pulling you down into a kiss that I don’t try to hide the passion from.

 

 

The night before we kill Chris Thompson, you don’t sleep.

The ground beneath us is hard, the fabric of the tent bellows in the gales, and it’s cold; so unbearable cold. We sleep in coats, wrapped in sleeping bags, tucked under blankets, and pressed against each other for warmth, but it’s still unbearably cold.

After an hour of hearing you awake, I throw the rest of my body over you and order you to sleep.

A little while later, I wake from a doze to realise you’re staring at me, your hand on my back, pressing me to you.

“You need to sleep,” I try again with a yawn. “Don’t leave me alone with that asshole tomorrow.”

You smile down at me and even through my sleep-addled mind I can translate that smile into emotions and theorise why it is you’re not sleeping: it’s not because you’re cold, or nervous, or excited; it’s because you’re terrified that this is the last time you’ll see me.

You think I’ll regret it. That I’ll kill tomorrow and it won’t be the beautiful event you imagined; that I’ll get scared, back out, run away. You’re thinking that it could be a trap; that as soon as you get the knife out tomorrow, twenty cops will come crawling out the trees. You’re lying awake wondering if you should fuck me now because you’re not going to get another chance.

I groan because this is far too much to be processing at 1am. I close my eyes and bury my head back against your chest. “Stop thinking, Hannibal. M’not gonna betray you. We’re gonna kill him, ‘k? Love you and ‘m not going anywhere. Later you can feed me and fuck me but right now you’ve gotta go to fucking sleep or I’ll fucking drug you myself, you egotistical _asshole_.”

I feel you smile into my hair and I don’t know which part of my reassurances did the trick but your hand tightens around my waist and then, minutes later, I feel your breathing even out and I follow you into a contented sleep.

 

At dawn, we wait for our victim amongst the reeds. We’re dressed in overalls with a bag full of tricks at our feet and you’ve taken on an unnatural stillness; like a beast awaiting its prey. We’ve planned the attack, the display, and the escape all to perfection, and now we wait.

We hear the car rumble through the quiet countryside. The slamming of a car door. The rustle of coats and clanking of tin and a metal rod. We imagine the squirming bait he has bought with him, caught in its confines, unaware of its superior purpose.

Thompson strides across field, footsteps falling deep into the snow. By the time they will find his body - hours, possibly days from now - the indentations will be long covered by fresh snow.

I had asked you, early on, why display him here at all but your explanation was quite simple, “I want him to feel alone. Isolated. And I want him to rot.”

I suppress a growl as I watch him move past us. _I want him to rot_. You are normally so meticulous about your displays, but for this, you wanted nature take its course.

I feel your hand on my arm, calming me, and I remember why we chose the slow, isolating, painful death that we did.

“This new creature acts with empathy,” you had said of our new dual-persona. “Thompson abused the love given to him in a way that we find most unsavoury. We want him to feel as abused as his lovers - splayed open to the elements, his insides ravaged, and his entire being in tatters. We want it to be days before the body is found so that everyone may know how much of a worthless animal he truly is.”

 _A worthless animal_.

We snarl. The knife is drawn. And then, we strike.

 

We arrive at the abandoned barn afterwards and the metallic tang of freshly spilled blood still hangs between us, so potent that I can almost taste it on my tongue.

We are barely through the door when your hands cradle my face, determined, and I see that your eyes are red and true. And then you’re kissing me; deeply, passionately, _finally_ ; stealing air from my lungs as if it’s yours for the taking. Taking, taking, pushing me back against a rotting beam that makes the whole barn quiver. Our splattered plastic overalls are the only thing left between us - a meaningless physical barrier - as you devour me with your mouth and I gasp for you to take more.

I’m trapped between the hard wooden beam and the pressing warmth of your body. You’re pushing so close it feels like you’re burrowing into me. Becoming me. I break the kiss with a gasp. “You were holding back,” I tell you, “All this time, you were holding back because you were afraid that I wouldn’t do it.”

There’s a sharp bite at my neck that makes me gasp followed by a gentle lick that pulls a whimper from my lips. You’re tasting me.

“You were already such a marvelous creature.” You cup my cheek, pull my eyes to yours. “I could not hope for your partaking as well as your understanding. I could not let myself believe… that you were truly this perfect,” you breathe against my lips. “But you are,” you tell me, pressing your lips against mine. “You truly are.”

Your look of wonder only lasts a second before the cloud of lust falls over us again and somehow between the vacuum of our twined bodies, your hand has come to press against my crotch. I groan and catch your earlobe between my teeth. There isn’t a single part of you I don’t want.

“We shouldn’t be doing this,” you’re saying as you lick a drop of blood from the plastic suit over my chest. “If we consummate our relationship here, we’ll desecrate the crime scene.”

And, god, only you would use words like _consummate_ and _desecrate_ while clawing at my body like a desperate, horny, teenager. But despite your warning words, you’re not stopping. I can feel your hardness pressing against my thigh and I want you just as desperately.

“Like that’s not a turn on for you,” I mutter and lift my hips to grind against the hand still cupping my pants.

You pull away just far enough to give me a look of disapproval before you’re back to marking my neck with your teeth and pushing your long fingers against my scalp under the black beanie you made me wear. I imagine doing the same to you - my fingers pulling at your hair - and it gives me an idea.

“If you wanna fuck here, we can do that,” I tell you, “Just don’t leave any _evidence_.”

My implied meaning must penetrate your lustful haze because you immediately stop what you’re doing and look at me like I’ve hung the fucking moon. You lick your lips with a smirk and I have a split second to regret my suggestion before you’re piercing a murder weapon through my overalls and across my crotch.

“Fuck,” I say, and at this point, I have no idea if it’s with horror or lust. There is a knife about two centimetres from my dick. You cut through the layers in seconds and flick the surgical knife back inside your sleeve. “Fuck,” I say again, and my head falls back against the wooden beam. Distantly, I hope that this stupid hat keeps my hair from being caught amidst the splinters because I’m far too gone to care about evidence right now. “You’re going to have to get a new suit-” but I’m cut short by the sudden pressure of your mouth on me. And, god, you’re sucking me hard enough that I forget how to breathe. “Okay, sure,” I say, “we can talk about that later.”

I curl my fingers through your hair, trying to hold onto my sanity as I’m enveloped in the heat of your mouth. My most delicate organ is between the lips of the most dangerous cannibal in history and the thought makes my hips jerk forward until you’re gagging on my cock. I’m about to pull back, about to apologise even, when your fingers dig into the flesh of my ass and pull me _closer._ I groan. _Of course you fucking like that_. I do it again and this time you moan around me and I feel the vibrations through every nerve in my body. I decide, right then, that if seeing you satisfied after a kill was the most glorious sight I could ever behold then hearing you during sex was the most glorious _sound_. I am greedy for it. I want to hear every surreptitious noise pulled out from you. Later. Later, I will hear them all.

“Look at me, Will.”

I had closed my eyes at the beauty of the sound. You don’t like that and you don’t let me look away again. With your eyes boring into mine, your sinful mouth wrapped around my cock, and your hand rubbing against your own crotch in desperation, it doesn’t take me long to reach the edge. I feel like I’m falling into your eyes, your soul, as I spill my seed down your throat.

We are one person.

I feel myself falter but I strain to keep my eyes open, for you, even as my knees weaken and my vision wavers.

Your hand digs into my thigh as my cock goes soft in your mouth. You hold me in place, your tongue curled around me, and your hand rubbing fast over your crotch until you suddenly jerk. The emerging wet stain and the minute relaxation of the muscles on your face are the only sign that you’ve come. _I’m going to break that_ , I think to myself, _one of these days I will have you screaming_. But for now, the utter decomposure of you having come in your pants will do.

I smirk as I untangle my fingers from your hair and zip myself back up. I offer you a hand to standing and your eyes are still locked onto mine. “So,” I ask, “did I taste as good as you imagined?”

 

I do not know what it is about the murder of Chris Thompson that has Beverley suspicious but I catch her looking at me in the way that she normally reserves for you.

We didn’t leave any evidence - even with our new dual persona, the Ripper doesn’t make mistakes - but perhaps I did not control my behaviour at the crime scene as much as I ought to have done. Maybe I knew a little _too_ much about the Ripper’s Copycat and his love for the Ripper. Maybe I watched the “grieving” girlfriend for a fraction too long. Maybe it was not my behaviour at all, only a matter of time before Beverley suspected. But somehow, I know that Beverly Katz has put two and two together.

I heed caution and wait until evening to see you, lest it raise suspicions. I haven’t seen you since we parted ways yesterday morning after the kill and I am eager to see you regardless. We have to be smart though, and so I wait.

When I knock on your door that evening, I half expect to see Beverley bleeding out on your kitchen counter. You'd once promised me not to kill the people we work with unless they forced your hand, but Beverley may have been foolish enough to do just that. I hope not though.

“Good evening, Will,” you greet as you open the door, and I blush just from the sound of your voice. We haven’t been intimate since our hurried tryst in the barn and I didn't realise until this moment how much I truly missed you. It feels like I can breathe again.

We'd planned to eat the spoils of our kill tonight and I'd been hopeful for an invite into your bed afterwards but our imminent danger seems to have put a damper on my mood, noticeable enough for you to comment on.

“So,” you say, reading my mind, “Is it Jack Crawford or Ms Katz that is the cause of your concern?”

“Beverly. Though, by now, probably all of the FBI.”

“Perhaps. Unless Ms Katz has learned to keep her suspicions to herself until she’s found sufficient evidence.”

“You think so?” I ask as you close the door behind me.

You lean close and brush your lips against my cheek. “I do,” you say with a smile as you pull away. “You’ve most likely given her a prime opportunity to search your property by coming here tonight.”

“She’ll find nothing.”

“Good,” you say as you lead me towards the kitchen. “But perhaps we ought to keep Abigail well stocked. Just in case, you understand.”

Our boat, of course. “Yes,” I say. “Just in case.”

 

Somehow we last another month and another two kills before Jack has enough evidence to come after us. We leave him an appropriate gift and are sailing away from the marina before he even sends out the call. We were always two steps ahead of him, and must continue to do so as we continue our journey.

The aptly named ‘Abigail’ is our vessel into our new life. The boat that you gave me last Christmas now fulfilling its purpose as intended.

When we are docked somewhere off the coast of South America, making the long way round to France, we finally toast to our victory. When I kiss your lips that night, they taste of red wine and fresh blood. You tell me that you love me in only the way you can, with metaphor and allegory, and just a small allusion to murder.

Under the stars, we will start anew. Under the stars, a new creature will rise.


End file.
